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Technology
Finding the ‘Right’ Balance: Privacy Rights and Biometric Data Retention in Northern Ireland By Sophie Treacy, SS Law In a world characterised by rapid scientific and technological development, it is no surprise that biometric technology, which enables police forces to identify individuals from DNA and fingerprint samples, has gained increasing currency in the field of crime prevention since the turn of the century. It is a fundamental principle of the criminal justice system to enhance the police force’s ability to effectively combat drug trafficking, corruption, and terrorism, which is in all of our interest. Nonetheless, other concerns weigh against this objective of equipping the police force with the most effective means of crime prevention possible. For instance, in the case of S and Marper v United Kingdom [2008], the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) in Strasbourg ruled that the United Kingdom’s biometric data retention regime amounted to an infringement of privacy rights under Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR). The applicants successfully challenged the indefinite retention of their DNA samples by the United Kingdom police force, after they had been acquitted on the grounds that it was an unjust infringement of their right to privacy. Whilst this decision heralded change to the biometric data retention practices followed by police forces in England and Wales, Northern Ireland is still in the process of responding to the Strasbourg Court. The concern underpinning the heel-dragging of the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) when it comes to conforming to ECtHR standards of biometric data retention is that it would undermine ongoing investigations by the Historical Investigations Unit (HIU) into deaths related to the Troubles in Northern Ireland. Herein, the tension between individual privacy rights on one hand, and effective criminal justice administration on the other, is particularly stark. What one considers to be the right approach to balancing individual privacy rights against optimal police investigation practices turns on how utilitarian one is willing to be. In other words, the extent to which one thinks individual privacy rights should be limited in order to maximise the effectiveness of police investigations.
Those who place a high value on individual rights freedoms, and are deeply suspect of utilitarian political theory, will consider the United Kingdom’s old regime of biometric data retention for indefinite periods of time to be a disproportionate and illegitimate interference with individual privacy rights. The other, more utilitarian, school of thought is that innocent citizens should have “nothing to fear” in having their biometric data stored indefinitely on a police database and accurate and efficient law enforcement, is in the interest of all, outweighs any infringement on individual privacy rights.
